“Adam is at college. He’s coming home this weekend,” Orville said. “But he doesn’t like to do anything that gets his hands dirty. See that black-and-white one over there, Mack? The one that looks like a Holstein cow—that’s your best one of the lot. I hear you’re steppin’ out with that Miller girl. She comes from good people. You should marry her.”

Mack felt the heat rising from his neck to his cheeks. Of all the things for his father to say in front of Braden, that dang sure wasn’t what he wanted Orville to get started about. “Yes, she does, and she’s a good woman. Now how about that brown goat out there? The one jumping up on the hay bale—you think she’s top-notch?”

“She’s a grade below the black-and-white one but still ain’t too bad. Have you moved in with the Miller girl? You moved in with Brenda, and Adam married her. Maybe you better not live with Vera’s daughter.”

“Maybe not,” Mack agreed.

“But he already lives with my mama, only he lives downstairs and we all live upstairs,” Braden told him.

Orville acted like he hadn’t heard. “I’m getting hungry. You reckon your mama has dinner ready yet?”

“Maybe,” Mack answered, glad that his dad was getting away from the subject of Lily and marriage. “Why don’t we go see, and if she doesn’t, I know that she keeps the cookie jar filled.”

Orville stood up and started walking straight out from the barn. Mack stood up and hurried to catch up with him. “We’d better go this way, or we’ll have to climb a fence.”

Orville chuckled. “I got turned around a little.”

Lily leaned her head back on the sofa that evening and let out a long whoosh of air—something way beyond a sigh. Mack had taken Holly and Braden over to the Torres place, and now he was out doing the evening chores. Thank God she had thought to invite Polly over for the afternoon. Orville had gone to Mack’s room for a nap, and Polly had caught Nora up on all the town gossip.

It had been years since she’d had an all-day event with anyone, including her two best friends, Sally and Teena, or even Mack. On Saturdays, he was usually in and out of the house, doing one thing or another out around the place. Lily closed her eyes and had started to doze off when her phone rang. She fumbled across the end table for it, barely opened one eye a slit to find the right icon to answer it, and said, “Hello.” She halfway expected it to be one of the kids wanting to know if she’d bring them the Harry Potter collection of movies.

“Is that you, Lily?” Wyatt asked. “Your voice is even huskier than usual.”

Her eyes popped wide open. “What? It’s me. Why are you calling?”

“Victoria kicked me out and moved a younger man into her house and into her life,” he said flatly. “I’m in a hotel in San Antonio with no job and no place to live. I lived on room service and paced the floor for two days before I decided to go to a therapist. After two sessions, I figure I owe you an apology.”

“Accepted,” she said. “Goodbye.”

“Wait a minute!” he almost shouted. “Give me a little time here. I want to come clean. Victoria wasn’t my first affair. I started cheating on you right after Holly was born. I tried to straighten up after Braden came, but”—he hesitated—“I couldn’t do it. I liked the thrill.”

Lily closed her eyes and counted to ten. “Are you trying to torture me by telling me this crap?”

“No, I just want you to know so you can move on with your life, too. I was smart enough to save my paychecks for the last year, so I can survive and won’t be begging off you. Evidently, I got my comeuppance with Victoria. I’ve been faithful to her, but she prefers younger men. I’m sorry for the things I did, and you deserved better than you got from me, and I hope you find it. I’m interviewing Monday for a job, and when I get my life in order, I want to be a better father and have a better relationship with the kids.”

“Well, I guess you’d better get started because that’s going to take a while after that motel stunt,” Lily said.

“Probably so,” he relented. “Now, a question, and you don’t have to give me an answer right now. You can think about it. If you aren’t coming back to Austin, will you sublet your apartment to me? The kids told me that their furniture is”—another long pause—“still there, and when I do get things right in my life, maybe they’d feel more comfortable coming to visit me there than in hotels. I’ll understand if you say no, but would you think about it?”

“I will,” she agreed. “Anything else?”

“You have my number. When you make a decision about the apartment, give me a call. Good night, Lily.”

The line went dead, and she sat there in stunned silence until Mack joined her. Smelling like soap and shaving lotion and wearing pajama bottoms and a snug-fitting tank top, he eased down on the sofa beside her. “It’s been a day. Dad was having a fairly decent day, and I loved having him and my mother here.” He slipped an arm around her shoulders. “But now I’m glad to have some time alone with you to unwind.”

“Wyatt called,” she said, and then she told him what the man had said.

“It’s your decision about the apartment,” he said. “I hope he will straighten up. He’s got two beautiful kids, and he’s sure missing out on a lot of their lives. They’ll be grown in a few years, and they won’t even know him. Dad asked me today why I didn’t marry you.”

Lily appreciated that Mack had said whether or not to sublet her apartment was her choice. Wyatt would have made the decision for her, much like she figured Fred had made all the decisions for Sophia. “Braden asked me if I was going to marry you.”

“Would you ever want to marry again?” Mack asked.

“Maybe.” Lily laid her head on his shoulder. “Mama would tell me not to judge the whole barrel of apples by one bad one.”

“That’s good advice,” Mack said. “You’ve got to have trust issues after the way Wyatt treated you, and you’ve been on your own for a long time. And you can see what I’ve got in my gene pool—the possibility of Alzheimer’s like my dad and a stupid ass for a brother.”

“I’d trust you with my life and with my kids as well, Mack. Besides, my mother died at seventy, my dad at the same age a year before her. Mama said that my Granny Annie only lived to be seventy, so . . .” She trailed off.